Rugby Runner

by Siggins, Gerard;

  ‘Gr8 about 2day but bummr bout Conokt’ he wrote. ‘Ill try 2 get bak 2 sch Weds 2. U workin on projct?’

  ‘No. I’m still thinking of an idea,’ Eoin replied. He had never got the hang of how to write text language.

  Eoin’s dad pulled up alongside in the car and he tossed his bags in the boot.

  ‘We were a lot better today,’ he told his dad, filling him in on the result and how the game had gone.

  ‘So it all comes down to next Saturday then. Maybe your mother would fancy a shopping trip up in Dublin and me and Dixie could take in the game…’ he mused.

  ‘Well, I hope you don’t mind seeing us getting hammered again. Those Ulster lads are good and I’m not sure we can get our act together in time.’

  Eoin was glad to be home. He didn’t get back to Ormondstown nearly as often as he had in his early years at Castlerock, and it was nice to get away from smelly room-mates and a menu that never changed. His mum always cooked him his favourite meals when he was home – though he had to phone ahead to let her know what he wasn’t allowed eat anymore.

  ‘Sure what harm would a chip do you?’ she said when he came in the door. ‘You’re wasting away up there in Castlerock.’

  Eoin laughed and hugged his mother, who ushered him into the kitchen where a steaming plate of food sat waiting for him.

  ‘I have it all there for you – broccoli, chicken, sweet potato,’ she pointed out. ‘And to be honest that sweet potato isn’t bad at all.’

  Mr Madden joined them, and they chatted over the meal about what everyone had been up to since they last met up.

  ‘Your grandad will be over later,’ said his mum. ‘He’s been a bit poorly lately but has been talking of nothing but how he wants to talk rugby with you.’

  Eoin smiled, and after helping wash-up he went upstairs.

  Chapter 12

  Eoin lay on his bed, staring at the ceiling and counting the spines of his books to keep his mind busy. He spotted the history book Grandad had bought him and took it down for a browse, marvelling at how funny the players looked in the early days of the sport, everyone wearing a moustache and whiskers and big, heavy boots.

  ‘Dixie’s here!’ came the call from his mum, and Eoin hopped up and raced down the stairs.

  ‘Hi, Grandad, did you hear we won today?’

  ‘I did – and many congratulations,’ smiled Dixie. ‘I hope you played well?’

  ‘I suppose so,’ smiled Eoin, ‘Ted was happy anyway.’

  ‘Well as long as you’re keeping your coach happy you’ll be fine,’ chuckled Dixie.

  The old man sat down and they exchanged a few stories about rugby coaches, before Dixie remembered something and reached into his pocket.

  ‘I came across the name of the fellow I was telling you about,’ he said, handing Eoin a newspaper clipping. ‘William Webb Ellis was his name, and they even named the Rugby World Cup trophy after him.’

  Eoin looked puzzled. ‘Why?’

  ‘Why?’ said Dixie. ‘Because didn’t he only invent the whole game – remember, I told you about him back at the Gaelic match.’

  Eoin nodded. ‘Oh yeah, it was at some school in England, wasn’t it? Rugby school. That’s easy to remember!’

  He read the clipping, which came from the Ormondstown Oracle, and told about how William’s father, James Ellis, was once stationed in the town as a soldier with the Third Dragoon Guards, along with his wife Ann Webb and their children.

  ‘That was back in Napoleon’s time,’ said Dixie. ‘A long, long time ago.’

  ‘It says here that some people think William might have seen a Gaelic match here and invented rugby because of that.’

  ‘I doubt that, to be honest’ said Dixie, ‘but who knows at this stage. We’ll never know the truth of it. But it’s interesting to know that an important man spent some time in our town as a small boy, isn’t it?’

  Eoin nodded, slowly, and sprang to his feet and scooted out the door. He dashed upstairs, grabbed the book he had been reading, and returned to the old man.

  ‘Sorry about that, I remembered the book you gave me, and wanted to see was there anything about William in it.’

  The pair turned the early pages, and found a drawing of how one artist imagined William had made sporting history. With his white shirt flapping and his tight trousers that stopped at the knee, William Webb Ellis cut an interesting figure as he raced along with the round ball under his arm.

  ‘It says here that his father died in a battle in Spain when William was six,’ Eoin read. ‘And that William never realised he had invented the sport.’

  Eoin looked at Dixie and smiled. ‘Thanks a lot for bringing this, Grandad. You’ve just given me a fantastic idea for my Junior Cert history project!’

  ‘And of course the book will give you a great starting point. We must investigate more about his time in Ormondstown too. But it was more than two hundred years ago so it’s unlikely there is any surviving evidence around the town.’

  Eoin was delighted with himself, as the project had been hanging over him and he had been starting to get nervous about it. When Dixie left and it was time for bed, Eoin brought the book upstairs and started to read it from the beginning. There wasn’t much about William in it, but he found it interesting how the sport had evolved to something that resembled how he and his friends played it in the twenty-first century.

  Switching off the light, he was asleep a lot quicker than he had been the night before.

  Chapter 13

  Eoin may have dozed off almost immediately, but his sleep was interrupted less than an hour later. He awoke to the sound of someone scurrying around his room, rummaging about on the shelves and in his chest of drawers.

  ‘Mam?’ he called. ‘What are you looking for?’

  But everything went quiet as soon as he spoke and no reply came to his question.

  ‘Mam?’ he called again, switching on the bedside light.

  Standing in front of the bookcase, clutching the book Eoin had been reading earlier with Dixie, was a strange-looking figure wearing long socks, pants that came to his knee and a long black coat. Under the coat he wore a white shirt tied at the neck. He peered through the gloom at Eoin.

  ‘I say, you. Do you own this book?’

  Eoin nodded.

  ‘I’m in it, did you know that?’

  ‘Really?’ replied Eoin. ‘What’s your name?’ although he already had a fair idea of what it was.

  ‘Will Ellis, young sir,’ replied the figure, who Eoin now knew was another of the ghosts from rugby history who came to visit him.

  ‘You’re the lad who went to Rugby School and ran with the ball, aren’t you?’ asked Eoin.

  ‘I am, young sir, and what a to-do that was,’ Will replied. ‘I got into HEAPS of trouble with the masters over that. We were playing a game called Bigside and the ball wasn’t being moved very much so I picked it up and decided to pep things along. The other chaps were quite angry with me, but it all died down soon after. Years later I heard about the sport, as it was some chaps from Rugby School who wrote down the first laws, but I was amazed to discover long after I died that they gave me the credit for inventing rugby!’

  ‘Yes,’ said Eoin, ‘And they even called the World Cup trophy after you.’

  ‘Yes – do you know about that?’ said William. ‘In fact, that’s why I’m here…’

  At that moment, Eoin’s door opened and the light seeped into the room. His father stood in the doorway.

  ‘Are you all right, Eoin?’ he asked. ‘We heard you calling your mum and then you seemed to be talking in your sleep.’

  Eoin nodded. ‘I’m OK, Dad,’ he replied. ‘I just had a bit of a nightmare, I think. Nothing too scary though,’ he grinned. ‘I’ll be fine.’

  His dad went back to his room, but Eoin’s midnight visitor never reappeared. Eoin picked up the book from the table where William had left it, and ran his fingers across the cover.

  He shook his head. ‘Another gh
ost for my collection,’ he smiled.

  Eoin spent the next couple of days of the mid-term break fooling around at home, helping his dad fix a few things and visiting Dixie. The old man was very excited about Eoin’s project.

  ‘Now, I can’t possibly do any work on this for you – that would be cheating which is a serious business in a state exam – but perhaps I can dig out some pointers for where you might do your research. I’ll head down to the library in the morning – would you like to come?’

  So next day, at ten o’clock, Eoin sauntered down to the library on Chambers Street. As he walked in, he spied his grandfather chatting with a familiar figure.

  ‘Hello, Grandad. Hiya, Dylan,’ he said, uncomfortably.

  ‘Howya, Eoin,’ came the equally uncomfortable reply.

  ‘Well, isn’t that a coincidence,’ said Dixie. ‘I asked to meet you both here at ten o’clock. I must have got mixed up,’ he added, winking. ‘Now, I don’t know why you two aren’t talking, but it seems to me that nothing should come between friends. You need to have a chat about it – and as libraries aren’t keen on that sort of thing – chatting – why don’t you two head outside and I’ll have a look through the books here. I’ll meet you both outside in half an hour and we’ll go down for a nice cup of hot chocolate in Daisy’s Cafe. You can take a break from the Leinster diet for once!’

  Eoin laughed as soon as they got outside, and after a couple of seconds of trying to keep his face straight, so did Dylan.

  ‘The old codger planned it,’ laughed Eoin. ‘He set us up.’

  Dylan nodded his agreement, and the pair thrashed out the problem between them. Eoin apologised that he had let Dylan’s concussion slip to Charlie, and stressed that he hadn’t meant it to get back to Mr Carey. He also told his friend that he had been thinking of telling Mr Carey himself, as Dylan needed to take his injury seriously. Dylan agreed, and said he was sorry for being so pig-headed.

  By the time Dixie came out with his hands full of photocopied sheets, the pair were laughing and joking about what had happened at the interprovincials.

  ‘I’m glad you’ve sorted that out,’ smiled Dixie. ‘Now, Dylan, how is that injury. Is your waiting period nearly up?’

  ‘It ends today, Mr Madden,’ replied Dylan. ‘And I’ve just emailed the Munster coach to let him know in case he’s planning to make any changes ahead of the final game at the weekend.’

  Chapter 14

  Eoin took the bus back to Dublin that evening, lugging his huge rugby bag and his suitcase of clothes that had been washed, ironed and neatly packed by his mum and dad that morning.

  He had brought the rugby book with him, devouring it as the bus made its way through the countryside, villages and towns on the road to Dublin. He also read the photocopies that Dixie had made at the library, and learned more about William’s father, who died a heroic death in Spain fighting with the armies of the Duke of Wellington – who was born in Dublin!

  He decided that, when he wasn’t training with Leinster, he’d spend the next few days in Castlerock working on the project.

  There were a few boys staying in school over the mid-term break, but his dormitory was empty. Eoin enjoyed the peace – it was a novelty not to have to talk to anyone and just read or listen to music.

  Next day he took the bus a couple of kilometres to where Leinster Rugby had their base. He was very early, so he watched the senior professionals train for a while, and was impressed at the unflinching way they went about their work. He knew he would have to toughen up more if he was to make a career in the sport.

  Ted arrived, and beckoned Eoin to join him in his office.

  ‘Did you see the trophy there in reception?’ he asked. ‘The bigwigs here were very happy with us winning that – they’ve given me a bigger budget to play with for the interpros – but they’re already moaning about losing to Connacht.’

  Eoin grimaced. ‘They didn’t notice we hammered Munster did they?’

  ‘No, they only notice the defeats,’ laughed Ted. ‘But another trophy would be hard for them to ignore.’

  They chatted some more about Ted’s plans for the weekend. He had been so impressed with how Rory had done that he had bumped him up the pecking order so he would be on the bench against Ulster. Eoin was great friends with Rory and Killian and didn’t want to take sides, so he just decided to be happy for both of them.

  Eoin asked Ted had he picked Marcus McCord, at which the coach threw his hands out wide.

  ‘What can I do? The bigwigs are terrified of his godfather. He’s not a bad player – although besides his try he was rubbish against Connacht – but we have four or five better second rows in the group. I’ll just have to live with it.’

  Out on the training pitch Ted took them through a few moves over the course of the morning, and at lunch told them he had selected two teams. He said that while the ones wearing blue were the front-runners in each position, he had an open mind and everyone had the opportunity to force their way in.

  The coach stopped the practice game frequently to hammer home various messages, and Eoin was much happier with the way the team had started to come together.

  Afterwards he dumped his kit in his locker and joined Rory, Killian and Charlie for a bite.

  ‘No scrum-half talk, you two!’ laughed Charlie. Rory grinned sheepishly at Killian.

  ‘No worries, Ror,’ smiled Killian. ‘I’m a complete fraud at scrum-half – I never even played there till the summer. If you get on ahead of me, I’ll be happy enough.’

  ‘You’ve been working out since London, haven’t you Ror,’ said Eoin. ‘You’re definitely bigger than you were.’

  ‘Well he’s hardly shrunk,’ said Charlie, ‘He doesn’t wash often enough for that!’

  The boys finished their meal and sat through another Ted talk about the strengths and weaknesses of their Ulster opponents. The coach had a couple of ideas for moves and Eoin watched closely as he ran through the plays.

  ‘Bo-ring,’ muttered McCord at the back of the room, just loud enough to be heard by everyone except Ted. One or two boys sniggered, but most ignored it. Eoin shot him a look that signalled just how much he disliked him.

  Eoin was still growling to himself about McCord as he caught the bus back to Castlerock. As he climbed down at the stop outside the school he was delighted to see that Alan was sitting there on the bench waiting for him.

  ‘Hey Eoin, what kept you,’ he laughed.

  The pair walked back up the drive to the school chatting about rugby, and soccer, and school projects.

  ‘I’ve decided I’m going to do it on the origins of rugby,’ explained Eoin. ‘I’ve got a really good book and Grandad found some stuff in the library too. It was a lad that used to live in Ormondstown that invented it.’

  ‘Cool,’ said Alan. ‘I wish I had thought of something that interesting. My dad convinced me to do it on the German bombing of Dublin during the war, just because his grandfather was a fireman and worked there that night.’

  ‘That could be cool too,’ said Eoin. ‘Did you talk to his grandfather?’

  ‘Nah, he died long before I was born. They have a few family stories though, but I’m not sure that will be enough.’

  Chapter 15

  The boys were alone in the dormitory, but Alan busied himself on his laptop checking the sports scores.

  ‘Do you know what you have to do to win the interpro?’ he asked Eoin.

  ‘Beat Ulster?’ Eoin replied.

  ‘Well, of course you have to do that, but you also have to beat them by at least eleven points. Look at this,’ he said, thrusting a piece of paper into Eoin’s hands.

  Among a jumble of numbers and scores, Alan had circled a group of figures in red which read ‘Ulster +37, Leinster +16, Connacht -7’.

  ‘What does that mean?’ Eoin asked.

  ‘That’s the points difference for each of the teams.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘I’ve checked the regulations on the IRFU webs
ite. If two teams are level at the end of the tournament the points difference will decide who wins. So say you win by ten points then Ulster go down to +27, and you go up to +26. Not enough.’

  ‘So we don’t just have to beat Ulster, we have to do it by eleven points,’ repeated Eoin, slowly coming to understand. ‘That makes it an awful lot harder.’

  ‘I know. But it’s important that you know that in advance. There’d be nothing worse than winning by ten points and thinking you’d then won the whole thing. That would be such a let-down.’

  ‘We need you in the Leinster set-up Alan, you think of all the important things.’

  ‘Well maybe I could start with Castlerock, as captain you could appoint me Team Analyst, or something like that.’

  Eoin laughed and pointed out that although Leinster already had one of them, he’d put a word in with Mr Carey.

  ‘Now, fancy a jog?’ he asked, reaching for his kitbag.

  The boys headed out to the sports fields to stretch their legs. They trotted alongside each other, chatting more about the game and the likely make-up of the Ireland team when it was all over.

  ‘The Connacht out-half, Joe Kelly, is pretty good,’ Eoin mused. He’s a better kicker than me, too. I’d be confident of making the match-day twenty-three, but I’m not sure about Paddy O’Hare from Ulster.’

  The pair reached the bushes that led to the Rock, and paused. ‘Want to check out if Brian is about?’ Eoin asked.

  ‘Yes, please!’ grinned Alan. ‘I hardly ever get to see ghosts and I haven’t seen him for ages.’

  Eoin led the way through the bushes, and sure enough there was his spectral pal sitting on the rock. They said their hellos before Eoin asked Brian had he seen Will again.

  ‘Yes, in fact he was around here last night. He was even more agitated than before. He kept muttering about rugby, and repeating the words “Webb Ellis”.’